


in your eyes i see the morning as it burns across the sky

by softswans



Category: Figure Skating RPF, Olympics RPF
Genre: AU, Domestic, F/M, Fluff, like minus zero angst, maybe a little
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-08-23 08:32:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16615532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softswans/pseuds/softswans
Summary: She forgets about that thought the minute the girl’s attention is turned on her, though, and she’s met with a pair of eyes that are bright, familiar, and green, green, green. (she’ll forever hate herself just a little bit for the fact that the first thought that crossed her mind, even though it was only for a half-second, at most, was that Scott had somehow had a child with her sister).Tessa wakes up in an AU where she and Scott are married with a little girl, which is decidedlynothow she'd envisioned her morning going.





	in your eyes i see the morning as it burns across the sky

**Author's Note:**

> hi, i'm back!! this started off as just a little exercise to shake myself out of my writer's funk & try to banish my writer's block that i've had since starting a whole _thing_ of angst in a google doc in like ... june. but i ended up really having fun with this, it's mostly just me stretching my writing muscles, but i enjoyed getting to play around with this scenario.
> 
> HUGE thanks to aimée, becca, cait & carol for reading over this and helping me out, i <3 you guys x
> 
> title from 'the dreams we never lost' by tide lines. (which is also a great post-sochi/pre-comeback era song)

When she wakes up, the first hint that something isn’t exactly right is the pillow below her head. Or rather, lack of it. A man’s arm constitutes what is usually memory foam. And her head feels as though it’s been sat on by a large horse. Taking a cautious breath, she adds a dry, funny tasting mouth to her list of strange observations on this very strange morning that’s lasted a whole of five strange seconds. 

 

First, she decides she must have been drinking last night, because who else wakes up with a headache and a dry mouth in a unfamiliar bed? Upon reaching this conclusion, though, Tessa realises she has no recollection of drinking the previous night. In fact, she keenly remembers watching Jeopardy with Scott before dozing off on his shoulder, at which point he helped her to her own bed, where she promptly fell back asleep, and he promptly made the trek to his apartment across the hall. Alone.

 

So that doesn’t explain why she’s found herself in a stranger’s bed, with a warm body pressed to her back and an odd sense of  _ home _ pervading her senses.

 

From her vantage point, she can see clean walls, a gentle white against a pale wooden bedside table to her left, where she can make out a phone (hers?), and a clock that tells her its 8:47 am in the morning. Much too early for this kind of confusion, if you were to ask her.

 

She doesn’t get the chance, however, to take a moment to breathe in her surroundings though, because the body married snugly to hers starts to shift behind her, the arm that served as her pillow withdrawing as the man (?) stretches to greet the morning. 

 

“Mornin’, Tess,” a voice hums, still deep with sleep, but familiar to her in a way it has been her whole life, in a way that makes her stomach drop. Scott. That’s Scott’s voice. She’s in Scott’s bed. Or he’s in hers? Or they’re in some stranger’s, apparently? Anyways. What the fuck.

 

“Scott?” her voice is still her own, so that’s a relief. She opens her mouth again to ask him if he knows what the everloving fuck is going on, but she’s interrupted by a distant clatter, and to her right, she hears him chuckle, his laugh still throaty and dripping in sleep in a funny way that sets off a warmth deep in her gut.

 

She doesn’t have time to ask him what’s so funny though, because the distant clatter is becoming less distant and suddenly it’s just outside the door before a blur of pink pajamas and pigtails burst into their room.

 

“Hey, pretty girl!” Scott’s voice is so unbelievably soft, and so filled with love, she can practically hear his smile. He intercepts the young girl before she reaches Tessa’s side of the bed, where she has abruptly sat up, mind reeling. Scott would have told her if they had been volunteered to babysit one of his nieces, right? 

 

The pigtails have started to giggle, Scott’s tickles making her squeal and writhe in his arms. “Daddy! Stop that!” She gets out, every inch her small body vibrating with glee. Daddy? She’s dreaming. She must be.

 

“Oh, I dunno, little bug,” Scott teases to her side, oblivious to her growing confusion. “I think we all know the rules about waking up Mom before she’s ready, don’t we?” His face turns solemn.  _ Mom? Who is this child’s mother? Where is she? Do I know her? What’s going on?  _ “Death by tickles, isn’t that right Tess?” He turns to her now, obviously expecting an answer.

 

“Hmm? Yeah, that’s right,” she answers absentmindedly, her mouth responding to him out of instinct more than anything else.

 

She wonders for a brief moment if maybe she hit her head at some point, and managed to forget a couple years of her life, because Scott would have told her about a little girl with his smile and easy laugh. Wouldn’t he? Her heart lurches just a little at the thought of missing out on something like this though. She knows he’d make an amazing dad, always has. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise that she was misfortunate enough to somehow skip past watching him get to experience that with someone else.

 

Someone who isn’t her.

 

She forgets about that thought the minute the girl’s attention is turned on her, though, and she’s met with a pair of eyes that are bright, familiar, and green, green,  _ green. _ (she’ll forever hate herself just a little bit for the fact that the first thought that crossed her mind, even though it was only for a half-second, at most, was that Scott had somehow had a child with her sister).

 

“Tess?” His voice breaks into her internal tailspin, sure and comforting. “Are you feeling alright, love?” and then, as if this strange morning couldn’t get any stranger, one of the hands that had been smoothing out the little girl’s plaits moves to rest over her abdomen, leaving a brand of warmth under his fingers.

 

“Little one giving you trouble again?” He frowns, and now she’s not just confused. She’s flabbergasted. Beyond baffled. Decidedly dazed. Certainly confounded. All in all, she’s extremely disconcerted, and her brows knit together, throwing her eyes to the bundle of quiet giggles in his lap. 

 

And then it hits her.

 

Collectively.

 

Oh. Oh.  _ Oh. _

 

Her eyes shift downward to the hand on her stomach and she nearly chokes on her own breath at the sight that greets her. Not only is Scott wearing a gold band across his fourth finger (and it  _ fits  _ there, so well, so much she almost wants to cry), but the skin beneath his adorned hand is raised. And not in the way that comes with indulging the week before her period. Pregnant. His hand is resting on her stomach, resting on a baby bump. She’s pregnant. And he’s married. And she’s in bed with him. And there’s a child in his lap with her eyes and his grin and her freckles dotted across her cheeks. 

 

He seems to take the choked noise that strangles its way up from her throat that seems to be rapidly closing in as a sign of something (of what, she’s not exactly sure), and he starts to move with what looks like a practiced ease. Suddenly his hand is gentle at her back, moving softly between her shoulder blades.

 

“Breathe through it, Tess, you’re okay. Are you going to throw up?” His voice is soft, unfailingly calm, and she shakes her head, sucking a deep breath of air into her lungs.

 

“That’s good, eh? Morning sickness hasn’t been so bad this week, maybe it’s in the rear-view mirror now?” He grins easily at her, and she can’t help but smile halfheartedly back; albeit out of habit more than anything else.

 

_ Morning sickness? _ Oh right, she’s pregnant, apparently. 

 

She must look a state by now, she can tell there’s no colour left in her face, her eyes wide & bewildered. Scott keeps his hand steady on her back, but turns his attention to the little girl who’s still in the room – who’s name she’s just realised; isn’t one she knows.

 

“Hey, Kitty Cat, what do you say we let your Mom rest for a bit while we make breakfast?” He addresses her, and Tessa’s chest fills up with a bright, leaping kind of joy when she watches a happy smile take over her young features. Freckled cheeks grin up at her and suddenly she has an armful of child, telling her in as serious a tone as a toddler can muster to ‘rest good’ before breakfast. 

 

On instinct (whether maternal or not, she doesn’t allow herself time to hesitate and think on the matter), she presses a kiss to the girl’s forehead, promising her that yes, she’ll do her best, just before she scampers off the bed.

Scott’s there, then, beside her, and his eyes are so open and full of love that a lump catches in her throat and she’s just so  _ confused _ , but he’s here, and he’s Scott. And she knows everything is going to be okay. She lets out a breath then, searching his gaze for something, anything that’s going to give her some clarity as to what’s going on.

 

“Are you sure you’re alright, honey?” His voice is soothing, and she feels more upset with her own self and her current lack of understanding for not being able to provide him with an answer.

 

“I don’t… I don’t understand, Scott. What is.. What is this? What’s going on?” He frowns, pressing a kiss between her eyebrows then, his lips unbearably soft against her skin. “You don’t have a fever, Tess... What’s the matter?”

 

“Nothing, nothing, I don’t think I’ve woken up properly.” She decides, shaking her head quickly from side to side. The movement is jerky, her hair following the motion. “I’ll follow you out, just give me a couple minutes, yeah?” Tessa asks him softly, hoping she’ll collect herself enough to walk out, greet them both, and pretend everything’s just fine.

 

Scott nods, and then his hand is cupping her cheek, and his lips are pressed lightly to hers  _ just so, _ and she barely even has time to process what’s she’s doing before she smiles against him, her heart glowing with a lovely kind of happiness. He leaves the room then with a smile and another kiss to her cheek, and it’s only after the door closes behind him with a soft  _ snick,  _ that she realises what he had referred to her as.

 

_ Mom. _

 

She’s somebody’s mother, in this universe. More than one somebody, in fact; if the bump across her waistline that can only mean the early months of pregnancy is anything to go by.

 

Immediately, she leans over to the side and picks the phone up off the dresser, hoping it’s hers, and blindly typing in her own password in a type of desperate hope that it’ll work. 9 – 2 – 8 – 7. Scott’s birthday. By some miracle, it does.

 

Tessa’s met with a grinning picture of herself as a home screen, the same girl that just called her  _ Mom _ holding her hand and Scott holding the other. She sucks in a breath, and a pang of  _ want _ hits her straight in the chest. She so badly wishes this was her reality; or one she remembered living. Navigating to the photos app (the layout is almost creepily similar to her own phone), she finds three albums; one titled ‘Wedding’, with a ring emoji beside it, another titled with a singular red heart, and the last one is titled ‘Katherine’. She hits that album first, her heart in her mouth and her fingers trembling. And there it is. Proof that this little girl is undeniably hers. Picture after picture of Katherine, as Tessa thinks she’s called follow her thumb as she scrolls, and she’s not even aware there’s tears rolling down her cheeks until one hits the phone screen.

 

_ Katherine.  _

She’d named her daughter Katherine.  _ Their daughter.  _ It’s so perfect, so wonderfully  _ right,  _ that she’s grinning again, and already manoeuvering herself out of bed to go embrace this strange new reality she’s been met with.

 

She follows the sounds of giggles and Scott’s laughter into the kitchen, where he bundles her up into a hug, a hand on her stomach and his lips on her hair. It all feels so domestic that she wants to both laugh and cry at the same time (out of joy or grief for what she’s missing out on, she’s not sure). There’s movement beside her trouser leg, and Tessa looks down to see a bright pair of green eyes looking at her, full of the love that accompanies childhood innocence, and she swears her heart grows three sizes. 

 

“Good morning, Kitten,” She finds herself saying, reaching down to pick the girl up in her arms, and the blinding smile Katherine gives her is more than enough to convince her that this, this life, is what she wants. 

 

“Mornin’, Momma. We made pancakes!” And that’s that.

 

* * *

 

 

When Tessa wakes again, she’s in her own bed, reacquainted with her memory foam pillow, and lacking the warm body behind her. She knows what’s missing now. Knows it in every part of her. The lack of drive that comes with the lack of competitive skating is now a problem she thinks she knows how to fix.

 

With that, a new plan for her day forms in her mind, and for the day after that, and the day after that.

**Author's Note:**

> i totally got inspired for this by remembering an old clintnat fic that i had read on tumblr like ... years ago, if anybody knows it please shoot me a link lol i miss it. anyways, i hope you enjoyed this as much as i did writing it, please let me know how you felt in the comments!! alternatively, come chat w me on twitter @virtuwu!!


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